A Lester MG (car no. 37) leads by a nose over a Lotus MK VI at the start of the 1958 Put-in-Bay Road Races. Images courtesy of Manley Ford, Put-in-Bay Road Races Reunion

After trial runs at last year’s event, this year’s Put-in-Bay Road Race Reunion on Lake Erie’s South Bass Island will add full-blown vintage racing in addition to a tour of the original street course for registered cars, a roundtable recollection discussion where original participants will share their memories and something called the MG “Octagasm.”

Action at the 1958 Put-in-Bay Sports Road Races

Though it gets very little of the recognition that the early post-war racing on the coasts still attracts, the Put-in-Bay racing that ran from 1952 through 1959 and then again in 1963 saw 292 different amateur drivers try their hand at racing. Restricted to under 2.0-liter engines for sports cars and under 1.5 liters for dedicated, closed-wheel sports racers, the original events were noted for not a single injury occurring to any competitors despite hay bales being the course’s most advanced safety feature. Bob Williams, one of the organizers, says, “This event is all about capturing and preserving some very important motor sports history, and Put-in-Bay is one of a very few locations in the United States where the roots of sports car racing, as it evolved in post WWII North America, can be so clearly traced.”

Program from the final Put-in-Bay Road Races from 1963

Although the tourism-dedicated island, which has a population of just over 600, including about 200 in the village of Put-in-Bay, has changed little since the 1950s, the world of racing has changed dramatically. Even by the end of the 1950s, organizers were aware that cars were getting faster and real racing needed to move to a dedicated track. But in its heyday, the cars entered included virtually every major European marque, along with a lot of minor ones. MG was, quite understandably, the most represented, but there were plenty of Triumphs, Alfa Romeos, Lotuses and Porsches. The list includes the likes of OSCA, AC, Maserati, Elva, Cisitalia, Renault-Alpine, HRG and even Isetta. There were even a few Crosleys.

For the reunion, the small Put-in-Bay airport will be closed to air traffic and used for competitive events, which include speed trials and some limited wheel-to-wheel racing. Three competitive categories are planned along with a fourth for an exhibition class. For obvious reasons, only parades and tours will be conducted on the old street course.

Vintage sports cars gathered at Joe’s Bar in Put-in-Bay on South Bass Island

Most famous as a base for Commodore Oliver Hazard Perry during the War of 1812 (“We have met the enemy, and they are ours.“), South Bass Island’s most significant structure is the 352-foot Perry’s Victory and International Peace Memorial observation tower run by the National Park Service that can be seen from virtually anywhere on the 1,600-acre island. Accessible by a short ferry ride from Port Clinton, Ohio, South Bass Island is located about three miles north of the Ohio mainland and roughly 10 miles northwest of Sandusky.

When I was a kid in the 1950s, one of the largest ferry steamers ever on the Great Lakes used to shuttle visitors regularly from Detroit to this island. It was called the Put-In-Bay ferry and it was a beautiful vessel. Most Detroiters back then referred to it as the “pudin’ bay ferry.”

It was a long, romantic cruise from Detroit to the island and there was a band and dance floor on board. Once on the island, I well remember taking the elevator up inside the huge obelisk monument on the island. The view from the top of this column was breathtaking. There also used to be numerous imported sports cars and horses on the island.

Of course, the ferry service ended by the fall of 1952 and the ship was towed out into the water and burned. I remember witnessing this burning with my parents as my mother cried. Thus the number of tourists to the island had to drop immensely for the years following for obvious reasons. So it would be easy to envision the time-warp effect where little change has taken place there. I have not been to the island in decades, but I recall the last time I went we had to take a little clunky flat-bed car ferry from Sandusky, Ohio area. The island, however remained as quaint as ever and I am sure it would be a wonderful (if not exotic) place today to hold vintage races.

My friend Bill McAllister were course workers at the Put-In-Bay race in (I think) 1963. I believe it was the last one. It was a fabulous event but not a safe place to be for anybody. The race was on the city streets and went through residential neighborhoods. The homeowners had been asked to stay on their porches during the race but most of them brought folding chairs right down to the curb! They had a great view, being only feet from the cars going by at high rates of speed. During the race a child went out into the street and somebody in an Elva Courier swerved to miss the kid and hit a couple of cinder blocks on the other side of the street. The car literally disintegrated and the driver was thrown out of the car, over a wrought iron fence and into a cemetery. His bell was pretty thoroughly rung but he was unhurt as was the child. The red hot wreckage and spilled gasoline were in the middle of the street and a big crowd of spectators gathered around the car, pretty much oblivious to the danger. I yelled at them to move back and emptied my one fire extinguisher on what was left of the car. Thank God nothing ignited but the folks standing around laughed at me and one guy told me to quit trying to act like a big shot. I guess it’s better to be lucky than smart. Even with the obvious safety and crowd control issues, I have great memories of the sights and sounds of those racers!

Roger,
I hope you remember me from the 1990 Healey Challenge helping coordinate Geoff Healey and John Colgate having a reunion with your Falcon Sprite. Now this year we are bringing John Colgate to the Homestead Conclave 2014 to link up with John Hill who worked on this car at both Sebring and at Le mans in 1960. We’d love to have you there as well and if you still have the car, please consider bringing it as well. I look forward to hearing from you again.
Dick

I wish the event well. But I think they’re making a mistake with trying to “Goodwood” it with only cars eligible from the original Put-In-Bay race days. Why not create a NEW tradition? Harkening back to the 50′s and early 60′s small bore rickshaws is fine and well, and God love ‘em. Neat neat cars. But the world didn’t stop there just because Put-In-Bay did! Release the hounds! At least homologate stuff into the 70′s…. I mean really.

Interesting that you should mention the similarity to the Goodwood Revival. I have always felt that the PiBRRR event could in the coming years morph into a North America version of what Goodwood puts on (an astounding weekend which attracts tens of thousands of people from all over the world). Put-in-Bay is probably the only place in the U.S. that could genuinely pull off something remotely like this: Vintage car racing one day, vintage airplanes flying in another, vintage boats in the harbor another, vintage music on the juke boxes and ’50s era attire by participants and spectators,etc.

I had the good fortune to have taken two of my Brit-born nieces to the Goodwood Revival back in 2005 and they both were enthralled — “like being in a movie!” they said, but that’s a vision for the distant future.

Near-term, our vision for the PiBRRR continues to evolve but I can safely say that we are all about pulling off an event that emphasizes the following:
- capturing and preserving the living history of the races that took place on this idyllic little island “back in the day” before that history is lost forever;
- providing opportunities for attendees to not just show up to race and have fun, but to engage with what’s really going on, share personal memories and connect with one another in a manner unlike any other such event that we are aware of
- having one helluva good time
I invite all who might be intrigued by this idea to come join us at PiBRRR 2012.
-Manley Ford
Communications Director
Put-in-Bay Road Race Heritage Society

As someone who has attended this event for the past three years, I must say that it is a great venue and a terrific time. I too wish they would not just limit it to cars that actually raced or were from that time period, and encouraged and opened it up to all vintage racing, but they did let me in with my 1965 Mustang! Thanks, and I can’t wait for this years event.

Fitting closely with racing historical vehicles, in my 1960′s high school days I remember seeing antique Ford Trimotor aircraft at a small airport and was told that they were the last Trimotors in active service, being used to transport people, etc to/from Middle Bass Island. Trimotors were slow but only needed very short runways making them ideal for island/mainland service.

I rode on the Ford Trimotor from Put-In-Bay to Sandusky way back when. It was a fabulous ride. the oil pressure gauges for the wing mounted engines were located on the engines themselves and the pilots had to look out their windows to check them. I may be the only living person to have fallen out of a Trimotor and lived to tell the tale. A friend and I were returning from a day of wine “tasting” and we were pretty, um, relaxed. There is a folding seat at the exit door of the airplane and after we landed, I stooped to climb down the ladder and put my weight on the seat which promptly collapsed. I summersaulted out of the airplane and landed flat on my back. I was embarrassed but not hurt. Had I not been about 20 years old and intoxicated, I probably would have broken my neck. The little airline also operated a Boeing 247, credited as being the first modern airliner. I had the pleasure of riding in that one too; happily without any acrobatics by me or the aircraft. The wing spar ran right through the cabin and you had to step over it to move from the front to the back of the airplane. Great memories!

These races were doomed by the Ohio legislature when, in response to rampant drag racing on public streets, they passed a law prohibiting racing on public highways. I believe they later passed a special bill allowing racing to resume at PIB but by then Les Griebling had decided to build a permanent racing facility near Lexington, Ohio to fill the gap left by PIB’s suspension of racing. This became Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course. That the abridged version of a long story!

The Put-in-Bay historical society has a register of the racers, but the 1963 race register is non existant because many of the racers would have to have forefitted the SCCA points if they raced in the non sanctioned event. Eventually the SCCA realised that many members wanted to run in the event, and then sanctioned it.

Wow,,,,, great book on such a perfect time, the names and the cars are all the fun. Reading it is like a you-tube video of the beginning of sports car racing in America. The written words and great pictures of the owner/drivers, brings out the thrills that they all must have experienced, in the competition of driving your sports car as fast as you can.
So many neat and exciting people that just flowed into the magic of the world sports car racing of the 60′s.. So glad I was there for at lease some of those early years, can’t begin to count the many life-long friends, …..and life-long memories.
Thanks Carl, with this book you brought us all together again….Tim LaGanke ,, Novelty, Ohio